Unfinished obelisk

The quarry with unfinished obelisk in situ

The granite quarries of ancient Aswan lay beside the Nile, thus providing easy access to boats for transporting this prized building stone to sites downstream. A crack in the granite stopped the cutting of what would have been an enormous obelisk (estimated at more than 40 meters high). Now the abandoned partially carved obelisk gives us information about how ancient stonecutters worked.